Have you ever wondered?
Why identical twins,
When they grow up, look different?
Same DNA, yet different.
Have you ever wondered?
Why the Calico cat with its myriad Rainbow patches,
When cloned, her daughter Copycat has a coat-quite different?
Patches elsewhere, unlike mom
Same DNA, yet different.
The mottled eyes of a Drosophila,
Red, white and mosaic,
Provide a clue to this mystery,
Juxtaposition of active and silent,
Silence spreads- HUSH…In quiet monotones,
A gene turns off; eyes turn blotchy- red and white.
An entire chromosome shuts off,
Females and males do equate, sometimes!
A random X shunted away into a corner, Barred from action
Silently resides: inactive, forgotten, Heterochromatinized.
Silent and active, Yin and Yang
A body full of cells, over 200 distinct types,
Same DNA yet different. Say why?
Transcription factors, the Masterminds orchestrate-
A giddy Gene symphony, an ensemble of sorts,
Pause, play and stop.
Right outside the bases, Methylation prevails
Imprinted on DNA and on histone tails,
Histones like Grandma’s spools twist, wrap and gather
The blueprint of life-part active, part silent,
A dynamic registry of marks; ON/OFF, Open/shut,
Some passed down through the generations? Possibly why not?
For now though, if you wondered what invisible thread binds,
The identical twins, the blotchy fly eyes,
The cloned cat with a locked away X-chromosome,
The answer lies here somewhere,
Same DNA yet different parts silent and active.
Author and Illustrator:
Roopsha Sengupta is the Editor-in-Chief at ClubSciWri. She did her Ph.D. at the Institute of Molecular Pathology, Vienna and postdoctoral research at the Gurdon Institute, University of Cambridge, UK, specializing in the field of Epigenetics. During her research, she was involved in many exciting discoveries and had the privilege of working and collaborating with a number of inspiring scientists. As an editor for ClubSciWri, she loves working on a wide range of topics and presenting articles coherently, while nudging authors to give their best.
The contents of Club SciWri are the copyright of Ph.D. Career Support Group for STEM PhDs (A US Non-Profit 501(c)3, PhDCSG is an initiative of the alumni of the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. The primary aim of this group is to build a NETWORK among scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs).
This work by Club SciWri is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
